There was a delay. He heard voices rising from the train beside him. The sound was mixed — anger, fear, hysteria.
“Hello!” he shouted. “Hello! Emergency! Get me Whyte!”
“I’ll take it,” a man’s voice said at the other end of the line. “Whyte’s busy!”
“Number 86 is back,” Tupelo called. “Between Central and Harvard now. Don’t know when it made the jump. I caught it at Charles ten minutes ago, and didn’t notice it till a minute ago.”
The man at the other end gulped bard enough to carry over the telephone. “The passengers?” he croaked.
“All right, the ones that are left,” Tupelo said. “Some must have got off already at Kendall and Central.”
“Where have they been?”
Tupelo dropped the receiver from his ear and stared at it, his mouth wide open. Then he slammed the receiver onto the hook and ran back to the open door.
Eventually, order was restored, and within a half hour the train proceeded to Harvard. At the station, the police took all passengers into protective custody. Whyte himself arrived at Harvard before the train did. Tupelo found him on the platform.
Whyte motioned weakly towards the passengers. “They’re really all right?” he asked.
“Perfectly,” said Tupelo. “Don’t know they’ve been gone.”
“Any sign of Professor Turnbull?” asked the general manager.
“I didn’t see him. He probably got off at Kendall, as usual.”
‘Too bad,” said Whyte. “I’d like to see him!”
“So would I!” Tupelo answered. “By the way, now is the time to close the Boylston shuttle.”
“Now is too late,” Whyte said. “Train 143 vanished twenty-five minutes ago between Egleston and Dorchester.”
Tupelo stared past Whyte, and down and down the tracks.
“We’ve got to find Turnbull,” Whyte said.
Tupelo looked at Whyte and smiled thinly.
“Do you really think Turnbull got off this train at Kendall?”
“Of course!” answered Whyte. “Where else?”